


Q&A

by draculard



Category: Star Wars: Thrawn Series - Timothy Zahn (2017)
Genre: Canon typical xenophobia and discrimination, Do Chiss hug?, Eli's parents, Humor, Lysatran shore leave, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Slash, That's it that's the plot, Thrawn dodging questions like a pro, Vague Chiss world building
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-12
Updated: 2019-07-12
Packaged: 2020-06-26 18:04:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19773553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/draculard/pseuds/draculard
Summary: If there's one thing Thrawn's good at, it's asking questions.If there's one thing he's bad at, it's answering them.





	Q&A

**Royal Academy Barracks**

“So what’s the weather like on your home planet?” Eli asked. He sat at his desk, surrounded by stacks of library datacards and facing the room’s only window; outside, rain was pouring from the dark Coruscant sky, lending a gentle, thrumming, entirely-too-soporific quality to his study session.

“It varies,” said Thrawn from where he sat on the lower bunk with his boots on the bedspread, “depending on the time of year.”

“Oh,” said Eli. He grabbed one of the datacards and spun it absently, not really hearing the clatter it made as it fell back to the desk. “So does it rain there at all?”

“There are many forms of precipitation,” Thrawn said, not glancing up from his datapad. Eli eyed him for a moment, but Thrawn seemed not to notice.

“Is one of those forms of precipitation, by any chance, rain?” Eli asked. Finally, Thrawn looked up, a slight wrinkle appearing between his eyebrows as he first looked at Eli and then at his stack of neglected datacards.

“Ah, I see,” said Thrawn, with a gently reproving tone. “You don’t wish to study.”

“What?” Eli followed Thrawn’s gaze to his datacards.

“We spent many hours selecting the proper datacards from the library for your use,” Thrawn said, “yet you seem disinclined to even look at them. One might conclude that your arduous and time-consuming selection process was, in fact, nothing more than a stalling technique.” He raised one blue-black eyebrow at Eli. “As is your current line of questioning.”

Eli sighed, turning back to his desk and resting his chin on folded arms. “You _never_ answer my questions,” he said. 

“I’ve answered all of your questions,” said Thrawn, turning back to his datapad a little stiffly.

“All of them except the simple, yes-or-no bit where I asked if it kriffing rains,” said Eli. He grabbed the same datacard from earlier and, with a flick of his wrist, sent it spinning on its edge. 

“Cadet Vanto,” said Thrawn, his voice even and patient, “do you think this is a wise allocation of your time? Is it more important that you understand the material covered by tomorrow’s test, or that you know whether or not my home planet ever experiences rain?”

Eli grumbled under his breath, refusing to answer. After a moment, he felt Thrawn’s intense gaze turn away from him, and he reluctantly picked up a datacard and slotted it into his datapad to study.

It didn’t escape his notice that Thrawn had successfully maneuvered his way out of answering the damn question. 

* * *

**Royal Academy Courtyard**

The sun was high and hot, burning right through the thick fabric of their uniforms. Distantly, Eli heard the shout of an officer calling them to attention; he snapped the flag in his hands forward, waited for the dismissal call, and then held his position a little longer. When the other cadets around him had started milling about and talking amongst them, Eli finally felt free to relax.

It was only a moment later that he felt Thrawn’s presence behind him. Both of them stared silently at the courtyard, Eli far too aware of the sweat beading beneath his cap. When he glanced at Thrawn, the Chiss’s posture was still perfectly erect, his hands clasped behind his back like a more relaxed parade rest. There wasn’t a hint of discomfort on his face.

Silently, Eli turned his attention back to the crowd before them.

“Do Chiss hug?” asked Eli.

It wasn’t a completely out-of-the-blue thing to ask, in his opinion. The class ahead of them had just graduated, and Eli and Thrawn’s unit had been required to attend the ceremony for every agonizing, sun-blistered moment, wearing their thickest and most uncomfortable uniforms. Eli had been stationed at the front of the formation, forced to carry the colors, and his arms still trembled from holding the flag straight and still for so long. 

Now, each of them had been dismissed for the day, and each of them was lingering behind to watch as the newest batch of ensigns greeted their families. For the few students whose families did not live on Coruscant, this was the first time they’d seen their parents since winter holidays — possibly longer — and there were more than a few proud, tearful reunions going on.

Just a few feet away from them, a plump, fashionably-dressed Coruscant woman embraced her uniformed son, who was doing his best to look unaffected.

“I’m unfamiliar with that term,” Thrawn said. Eli snorted; sometimes, he suspected Thrawn had taught himself Basic using a dictionary. Sometimes, in situations like these, he suspected that dictionary contained nothing but technical jargon.

“It’s what those people are doing,” he said under his breath, nodding at the woman and her son. “It’s like a form of greeting. You and the other person wrap your arms around each other like that.”

“I see,” said Thrawn. His gaze was now fixed on the mother and her son, observing their every movement. “Is this greeting restricted only to blood relations?”

“Well…” Eli hesitated. “No, not really. Lots of people hug their friends, and some people even hug strangers who they’ve just met. On special occasions, it’s more or less acceptable to hug anyone who’s okay with it.”

“I believe our handbook includes restrictions on physical contact while in uniform,” Thrawn said, his eyes narrowing thoughtfully. Across from them, the mother and son broke apart, both smiling as they caught up with one another.

“Well, yeah,” Eli said. “I mean, you wouldn’t go around just randomly hugging other cadets or anything. But there are exceptions for situations like these.”

“Why?”

“Because you can’t tell a mom that she’s not allowed to hug her kid after he’s been away at the Academy for four years,” said Eli. “That would just be cruel.”

Thrawn straightened up a little, scanning the crowd for more hugging pairs. There were plenty of examples in sight. “Do other exceptions apply during ceremonies?” he asked.

Eli briefly stretched up on his tiptoes, hoping to see whoever it was Thrawn was staring at. He couldn’t see over the crowd, but it gave his calves a good (painful) stretch after nearly two hours of standing in formation. “Of course,” he said. “No one would stop an Imperial from hugging his partner or children just because he’s in uniform.”

“Partner?” Thrawn asked.

“Romantic partner,” Eli said. To his intense frustration, he was blushing as he said it, though he couldn’t figure out any reason why he would be. Luckily, if Thrawn noticed, he didn’t comment. 

“I see,” said Thrawn. “Then the military restrictions apply only to friends and fellow warriors.”

“Well, yeah,” said Eli. “More or less.” He turned his head a little, eyeing Thrawn, who was still carefully observing the crowd of new graduates. “So do Chiss hug? Or is it just a human thing?”

“Many alien races have their own variant,” Thrawn assured him. “I have seen similar gestures among humanoids in the Unknown Regions.”

“Right,” said Eli, “but do _Chiss_ hug?”

“Ah,” said Thrawn, nodding once, as if he hadn’t understood the original question. “The Chiss have many physical forms of greeting one another.”

“Is hugging one of them?” asked Eli — rather patiently, he thought. 

Thrawn circled around to face the west end of the courtyard, subtly drawing Eli’s attention to a brand new ensign who was currently kissing a woman — presumably his wife.

“Humans have many forms of physical greetings, as well,” Thrawn noted. Eli opened his mouth to confirm this, then noticed the slight face Thrawn was making, his nose wrinkled as he watched the couple. Eli couldn’t see why; it had been a brief, chaste kiss. Certainly nothing to grimace about.

“Do Chiss kiss each other, then?” Eli asked, abandoning the hug question with good grace.

“Absolutely not,” said Thrawn. “That’s disgusting.”

* * *

**Royal Academy**

**Two days before graduation**

Eli’s arms were pillowed beneath his head as he stared up at the ceiling; some cadet who’d had this room before him had applied nightglow stars to the tiles above his head. Definitely against regulation, but evidently none of the inspectors had ever glanced up and noticed them during the day.

He couldn’t sleep, and he knew Thrawn wasn’t sleeping, either. The Chiss made a weird, soft sound when he was sleeping — something caught halfway between a snore and a purr, a sound Eli had only been privileged enough to hear when he woke up in the early hours of the morning to use the fresher — and right now he was completely silent. When Eli glanced over the edge of his bunk, he could see the dual glow of Thrawn’s datapad and his red eyes.

He sighed, flipping over onto his stomach with one arm pinned beneath his chest. The blankets seemed far too hot and heavy; the cooling unit attached to the far wall wasn’t doing its job, though it was currently making an unpatterned wheezing sound that seemed to grow more deafening — and irritating — as the night wore on.

Finally, with another, louder sigh, Eli rolled back onto his back and glared up at the nightglow stars. He wasn’t even tired, yet he had nothing to do to distract himself from boredom. There was nothing left to study for; classes were officially over, with graduation coming after the weekend. Some cadets had been granted leave for the next two days; Eli’s paperwork had gotten mysteriously lost, and he was stuck here in the uncomfortable Academy bunk with nothing but boring library datacards to occupy his time.

Well, datacards and Thrawn. Not that Thrawn was much better than a datacard, company-wise.

Still, he was better than nothing.

“Hey,” Eli whispered, his voice sounding strangely loud against the white noise of the cooling unit. There was no response. “Hey, Thrawn?” he said.

“I am awake,” said Thrawn evenly.

“I _know_ ,” said Eli, somewhat peeved and already regretting this conversation. “I have a question for you.”

The light from Thrawn’s datapad dimmed. “Your well of questions never seems to run dry,” he said.

The sheer audacity and lack of self-awareness of this statement nearly rendered Eli speechless. He powered through it to get to his question.

“What’s your home planet called?”

There was a brief silence.

“I know you’re called Chiss,” Eli said, “but this whole time I’ve never thought about what your planet is called. Does it begin with C?”

“I don’t see why it would,” Thrawn said. “Is this a human custom? I know of Coruscant and K’rella—”

“Corellia,” Eli corrected automatically. 

“Co-rel-lia,” Thrawn repeated, very carefully.

“Yes,” said Eli. “And no, it’s not a human custom. I just thought maybe _Chiss_ was a derivative of your planet name.”

“ _Chiss_ refers to species, not to nation or planet of origin,” said Thrawn. “Humans from Corellia may refer to themselves as K’rell’n—”

“ _Corellian,_ ” Eli said. “How did you get it right the first time and then completely mess it up the second?”

“—but humans do not originate from a planet called Humilla, after all.”

Humilla, Eli thought, was not what he personally would have chosen to name a hypothetical planet named after humans. He felt like he had the necessary threads to weave together a deduction from that, but he was far too tired to do all that work.

“Lots of alien races share a root word with their planet’s name,” he said instead. “Geonosians are from Geonosis.”

“And Wookiees are from Kashyyyk,” Thrawn pointed out. Eli rolled over onto his side, leaning over the edge of his bunk so he could see Thrawn’s face.

“And Chiss are from…?” he prompted. 

To his surprise and delight, Thrawn glanced up at him and graced Eli with a small, quick smile.

“I certainly never meant to imply we had only one planet,” he said. “Perhaps, like humans, our origins are widespread and diverse. Perhaps I come from a colony world. Or perhaps our planet of origin has simply been lost to time.”

“If you can’t remember what your home planet is called, just say so,” Eli said, gambling with little hope to get a rise out of Thrawn. Predictably, Thrawn didn’t take the bait. He switched his datapad back on and eventually, reluctantly, Eli hauled himself back into his own bunk, where the light from Thrawn’s screen — and eyes — was more muted.

“You’re just not gonna answer the question, huh?” Eli said, staring gloomily up at the nightglow stars. Try as he might, he couldn't get the image of Thrawn's smile out of his mind.

“Sleep well, Eli,” Thrawn replied.

* * *

**The Blood Crow**

There was a holoprojector set up in one of the small common areas on the Blood Crow, its frequency typically set to one of two popular channels from Coruscant. The first was a cooking network specializing in walk-through recipes, cooking game shows, and food-based travel documentaries.

The second channel…

“This is considered entertainment?” said Thrawn. His eyes were narrowed disapprovingly at the holoprojector.

“This is why I hate eating here,” Eli commented. “If you don’t like murdercams, just keep your eyes on your food.”

“Murdercams,” Thrawn repeated with a note of distaste in his voice. “So humans derive pleasure from watching other humans die while they take their meals.”

“It’s not _really_ people dying,” Eli said, a bit defensively. “Anytime it shows someone dying, it’s just a reenactment. It’s a very popular genre.”

“Explain,” said Thrawn.

“People are fascinated by murderers,” Eli said, shrugging. “Most people would never kill somebody, so we’re all a bit curious about the people who do. We want to know what makes them tick. And there’s a bit of morbid fascination, too, about the whole process of death — some people want to know all the grisly details.”

“Why?” asked Thrawn immediately.

“I don’t know,” said Eli. “Don’t you have murdercams back home?”

Thrawn stiffened a little, evidently offended by the mere suggestion. “Those Chiss who indulge in holorecordings generally possess finer taste,” he said.

Eli frowned at him. “Which isn’t exactly a yes-or-no answer.”

“Similarities in entertainment can be found across all corners of the galaxy,” said Thrawn testily. “The market for aristocratic romance novels on Rodia is strikingly similar to that on human-dominated Core Worlds, for example. The traditional operas of Duro are thematically identical to those of _Co-rel-lia,_ but bear little resemblance, structurally, to the ethnicity-based operas of the Neimoidians, despite their close genetic connection to the Duros. Chiss do indeed share a similar physiological structure to humans; this does not by any means indicate that Chiss share humans’ cultural fascination with gore.”

Why did Eli feel like Thrawn was calling him racist?

“This is hardly gory,” he complained, pointing at the holo with his fork and mentally shaking off Thrawn’s weird species-based deflection. “There’s not even any blood. And it’s completely fake.”

“Chiss find the premature loss of life distasteful,” Thrawn said. He looked down at his food and then made a big show of pushing it away. “Particularly when that loss is caused by another sentient being, with a sense of malice.”

“Oh, stars,” said Eli, rolling his eyes. “You know, all you’re doing is convincing me that Chiss _do_ have murdercams.”

Thrawn didn’t answer; he only glowered at Eli, who was busy shoveling poorly-seasoned lott noodles into his mouth.

“How do you know what Rodian romance novels are like, anyway?” Eli asked.

“Novels of any genre are an intellectually-lucrative and informational art form,” said Thrawn. He cast a frosty glance toward the holoprojector, where a Twi’lek actress was pretending to poison her husband. “Which is more than I can say for this … krayt spit.”

Startled, Eli came very close to snorting a lott noodle out of his nose. “I told you to forget that phrase,” he said, covering his mouth with one hand. 

“I tried,” said Thrawn innocently. He gestured to the other side of the room, where the Twi’lek husband was going through his death throes. “The gruesome imagery on the holoprojector must have startled it out of me. I’m unaccustomed to such graphic displays.”

“Right,” said Eli. Hadn’t he heard somewhere ~~from Thrawn himself~~ that Thrawn had been a high-ranking military officer before he was exiled? Surely he'd had plenty of time to get used to 'gruesome imagery' there. “I’m going to start keeping count of every time you refuse to answer a question,” Eli warned. “Especially these simple yes-or-no ones. Those are the worst.”

“I’m certain you’ll keep that promise,” said Thrawn, his voice grave. “You have remarkable skill in list-making.”

Eli sighed; surely, knowing Thrawn, that had been meant as a compliment, but it just made him feel even more exhausted than Thrawn’s constant dodging of the murdercam question had.

“Just let me eat my lott noodles in peace,” he said.

* * *

**Lysatra**

**Shore Leave**

Sometimes, in the brief moments in-between perilous courts-martial and smuggler-hunting missions, even Eli and Thrawn could get leave chits approved. Eli was still staring at the form on his datapad even now, somewhat stunned that it hadn’t been ‘lost’ like all his other leave chits had been since his transfer to Royal Imperial.

He darted a quick look at Thrawn, who was carefully landing their shuttle in an overgrown Lysatran field. Satisfied that Thrawn wasn’t looking at him, Eli brushed his fingertip over Commander Cheno’s signature, positively beaming with excitement.

Two whole weeks of leave. Two well-earned, long-overdue weeks.

Of course, he was more or less stuck with Thrawn the whole time, but he supposed he could deal with that.

“Ensign?” Thrawn said. “Perhaps you could explain a concept to me.”

Oh, great.

“Of course, sir,” said Eli — he’d been more careful to tack ‘sir’s on to the end of his sentences ever since Thrawn’s promotion to captain. It was still a little strange sometimes, and he was fairly certain Thrawn would never comment on it if Eli didn’t, but Eli had already been reprimanded for it by more than one uppity lieutenant who thought that calling an alien ‘sir’ was some sort of punishment.

“Commander Cheno spoke of ‘use it or lose it,’” said Thrawn. “This phrase seemed to hold some significance for you in regard to your home planet. Is it Lysatran in origin?”

Eli snorted, gripping the seat harness as their shuttle finally, gently landed in the field. “‘Use it or lose it’ just means that we’ve accumulated too many leave days,” he said. “The Navy doesn’t let you collect any more than forty days at a time, so once you reach that many, your only real option is to take leave. Or you could sell it back.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You can sell it back to the Empire,” Eli said. “I’m not sure what the rate is. Basically, you agree not to take those forty days, and your leave counter resets to zero, and your next paycheck is a little fatter for it.”

Thrawn said nothing for a moment, but his gaze was far away and thoughtful. “The Chiss have similar folktales,” he said, undoing his own harness. 

“Folktales?” said Eli, trying his best not to sputter. “About military leave procedures?”

“About creatures who purchase time,” said Thrawn, “and foolish Chiss who sell it.”

“Oh, stars,” said Eli, “it’s not like that.”

Thrawn didn’t argue — but as they left the shuttle, Eli could feel an existential crisis pawing at the edge of his mind. He firmly pushed it away. 

Trust Thrawn to make Eli feel unsettled about _taking leave._

They walked down the exit ramp together, each of them taking a moment to adjust to the Lysatran gravity and the now-unfamiliar feeling of solid ground beneath their feet. Thrawn, of course, seemed to adapt faster than Eli did; perhaps being on Lysatra for a two-week vacation was no different to him, emotionally, than a harrowing court-martial on Coruscant.

For Eli, it was a world’s worth of difference. On Coruscant, his heart was always in his throat, his nerves jumping so high he barely noticed he was planetside at all. When he thought of Coruscant, all he got was a jumble of anxious and vaguely nauseating memories — but Lysatra was his home, and this was his grandfather’s farm, and his parents and all his aunts and uncles lived right down the road. 

Just being here was enough to banish Thrawn’s weird soul-crushing folktales from his head.

“I wonder if my bedroom is still the same,” Eli mused as he and Thrawn strolled down the old dirt road through the fields. Eli found himself increasing his pace without even thinking about it; silently, Thrawn matched him, making no complaint.

The Vanto family home certainly hadn’t changed. It was larger than the others in the area, and more modern — his father had had it designed according to his own parameters when their shipping business really took off. The hangar off to the side could accommodate up to twenty mid-size ships, and had been built on their family’s portion of the farmland inherited from Paw-Paw.

It looked gloriously familiar to Eli’s eyes. By the time he and Thrawn reached the yard, his parents were spilling out of the front door — his mother’s arms open for a hug, his father smiling broadly at him and only scowling a little at Thrawn.

“Eli,” Mrs. Vanto breathed, pulling him close. Mr. Vanto came up close behind them, wrapping an arm around them both.

“You brought the alien,” he muttered, _definitely_ loud enough for Thrawn to hear. Briskly — perhaps trying to cover up her husband’s rudeness — Mrs. Vanto broke away from him and approached Thrawn with a nervous smile on her face and her arms outstretched.

“I’m a hugger,” she warned him.

“That’s admirable,” Thrawn said, sidestepping the hug. Eli snuck a glance at his mother, who looked like someone had pulled the carpet out from under her, and then at his father, who couldn’t seem to decide whether he was relieved or offended that the alien had refused to hug his wife.

They moved into the house with Thrawn trailing behind them, his eyes sweeping analytically over everything in sight. Once they were in the foyer, Mr. Vanto turned on his heel with his arms swept out at his sides and said,

“We’ve made some additions since you left. Wait ‘til you see the dining area.” Then, for Thrawn’s sake, he added, “I designed this house myself.”

“It shows,” said Thrawn. Eli winced.

“He means he can see aspects of your personality in the design,” he said, hoping fervently that this _was_ what Thrawn meant. “Captain Thrawn has … a lot of enthusiasm for art.”

“Oh,” said Eli’s mother, her voice coming out strange. She gave Thrawn a strained smile, eyes flickering briefly to Eli’s ensign insignia. “So you’re a captain now?”

Again, Eli winced. Thrawn’s promotions were a touchy subject for him, but an even touchier subject for his parents; he hadn’t bothered to inform them about the latest one. 

Luckily — and against all odds — Thrawn seemed to notice the tension in the air. He stepped closer to a Lysatran relief carving that wrapped around the doorway, examining it with appreciative eyes. Before either of Eli’s parents could latch onto the promotion subject, Thrawn said,

“This craftsmanship is exquisite, Mr. Vanto. Did you carve it yourself?”

Eli held his breath, desperately hoping his dad would take the bait. For a moment, Mr. Vanto seemed unsure whether he was willing to let the promotion go; then he deflated a little and gave Thrawn a half-nod.

“I designed it,” he said. “My brother and I shared the work.”

“I see.” Thrawn glanced to the side, catching Eli’s eye — but if he was trying to communicate something, Eli couldn’t decipher it. Seemingly satisfied, Thrawn turned away again, and for the rest of the night he was as unobtrusive as possible. 

He was silent at dinner, and when Eli’s uncles and their families came over to visit. He was silent even when addressed directly; when Eli’s cousin asked, “So you’re Thrawn?” Thrawn only nodded. Some of Eli’s family possibly put this down to shyness; most of them, he could tell, just thought Thrawn was rude, and clearly felt justified in dealing twice as much rudeness back.

It was almost a relief when it was over; Eli said his goodbyes to his parents, gave his mother another tight hug, and made his way back across the field for the night. His childhood bedroom, as it turned out, was entirely intact — but his parents had made no effort to provide a room for Thrawn, and it only seemed right for Eli to join him in the shuttle so he didn’t feel…

Well, exiled. 

They walked across the field silently; Thrawn walked with his hands clasped behind his back and his eyes on the distant shuttle, a thoughtful look on his face. Eli himself could not stop looking at the Lysatran night sky — the familiar constellations he’d all but forgotten, the unique red-purple glow of aurora up above. 

Seeing it all again after so long made Eli’s throat tighten. He blinked rapidly, suddenly overwhelmed by it all, and hurried the last few yards back to the shuttle. Thrawn wasn’t far behind him, his face impassive as usual.

He was getting dressed for bed, lost in thought, when Thrawn spoke for the first time in hours.

“Why did you select Lysatra for shore leave?”

Eli froze as he processed the question, then finished pulling his sleep-shirt over his head and turned to face Thrawn, eyebrows knotted. “It’s my home,” he said. Thrawn, still dressed in his day clothes and evidently not interested in changing, sat on one of the small bulkhead bunks. He leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, an uncharacteristically weary-looking posture.

Perhaps the long night of sneers and insults had affected him more than Eli realized.

“Your home, yes,” Thrawn murmured, not meeting Eli’s eyes. “But why return?”

Baffled, Eli replied, “Well, because I missed them.”

“Missed them,” Thrawn repeated. “Your family?”

Eli thought of his cousins, some of whose names he hadn’t recalled until his mother subtly tipped him off. “My parents, mostly. And this area in general. It’s where I grew up.”

Thrawn said nothing; his chest rose and fell in what may have been a silent sigh.

“Don’t you ever miss your family?” Eli asked. Thrawn’s eyes narrowed, and after a moment Eli realized he wasn’t glaring, just mulling over the question.

“That is the second time you’ve used that word,” Thrawn said. “I do not understand the context.”

“What word?” asked Eli. “Miss?”

“Yes.”

“It means…” Eli struggled for a moment to define it; it was rare that Thrawn asked him about such a small, simple word. “Well, when I say ‘do you miss your family,’ what I mean is, do you ever get sad thinking about how you’ll never see them again?”

A flicker of emotion — surprise, hurt — passed over Thrawn’s face and was quickly erased. Immediately, Eli realized what exactly he’d said. 

“I mean, _if_ you’ll ever see them again,” he corrected himself quickly, flushing from the gaffe. “I didn’t mean to imply—”

“I _am_ in exile,” said Thrawn, his voice deceptively mild, his face carefully blank. “Your implication was accurate.”

Eli studied him for a moment, looking for any sign that he should drop the subject — but how would he recognize such a sign, even if it were there? Even at the best of times, he could barely read Thrawn’s body language.

“If you’re tired, sir,” he said cautiously, “just tell me to shut up and I’ll drop it, okay?”

Thrawn said nothing; he rubbed his forehead and stared at the floor, away from Eli’s curious eyes. Slowly, Eli folded his day-clothes and stowed them in a bin built into the bulkhead before collapsing on his own little bunk. He propped himself up on one elbow so he could see Thrawn.

“Do you miss your family?” Eli asked again. “Or your home planet?”

“Csilla,” said Thrawn quietly. Eli blinked, simultaneously understanding what Thrawn had said and refusing to believe it.

“What?”

“It’s called Csilla,” said Thrawn.

Eli could only stare at him; how many times had he begged Thrawn for information about the Chiss? How many times had he _specifically_ asked what his home planet was called? And now Thrawn was just casually name-dropping it, when Eli hadn’t even asked?

“Csilla,” Eli repeated wonderingly, and finally, Thrawn looked up and met his eyes.

“Close,” said Thrawn, with a hint of approval in his voice. “Your pronunciation leaves something to be desired, but—”

“Oh, stuff it,” said Eli. He rolled onto his stomach and folded his arms beneath his chin, stifling a smile. “What’s it like?”

Slowly, Thrawn sat back, his posture relaxing a little bit as he leaned against the metal bulkhead. “Exceedingly frigid,” he said, turning his head to look out the viewport.

“It’s cold?” 

“Some areas are more temperate than others, of course,” said Thrawn. His red eyes seemed far away, their glow dim. “Where I was born, it’s rarely warm. Certainly, it never reaches anything akin to Lysatra’s climate.”

“ _How_ cold?” Eli asked. “Like, in degrees?”

“Our measurement system is different,” said Thrawn thoughtfully. “The warmer areas of Csilla sometimes reach the freezing point.”

Eli’s mouth fell open briefly; he was glad Thrawn wasn’t looking at him in that moment. “Do you have aurora there, too? Those lights in the sky at night?”

“Yes,” said Thrawn, his voice barely audible. “On a different section of the color spectrum. Shades of blue and green are more common; yellow just before a storm.”

Eli tried to imagine it, but it was extraordinarily difficult; the aurora over Lysatra was always red or violet. 

“It must’ve been miserable growing up there,” he said, thinking aloud, remembering his own childhood. Long summers playing in the fields, swimming in rivers and city pools, warm autumns and winters with just enough snow for a few days of sledding.

“It was beautiful,” Thrawn said.

“Well, I’m sure it was,” said Eli. He’d seen holos of ice-covered worlds before. “But what did you do for fun?”

With a sigh, Thrawn stood and shucked his tunic off, neatly folding it before he placed it in his bedside bin. Automatically, Eli turned away, though he knew from their days at the Academy that Thrawn slept in his uniform underclothes and would not be showing any skin. 

The shuttle lights dimmed and Eli heard the blankets rustling as Thrawn lowered himself onto the bunk. He turned to face him again, only able to make out his form thanks to the crimson glow of his eyes. 

“I lived very near to a frozen ocean when I was small,” said Thrawn. “In some places, the water froze to a high level before it thawed, leaving a thick scrim of ice on the surface while the water beneath retreated and froze again as temperatures dropped. My brother and I would find these areas and cut a hole in the top layer so we could lay on animal hides on the layer below and look at the sky through the ice above. At night, or during the day in winter, when the sun never rose, we would risk frostbite to see the aurora under the ice.”

He hesitated — opened his mouth and closed it again before lapsing into silence. Across from him, Eli absorbed the story. He found it insanely easy to imagine two little blue-skinned Chiss boys hauling blankets made of animal hide across a frozen ocean and building a cozy fort beneath the ice.

“I didn’t know you had a brother,” he said. It was a long time before he received an answer.

“I don’t have any family anymore,” Thrawn said, his tone neutral, unemotional. “Exile, Ensign Vanto. Remember?”

Eli flushed and nodded his silent understanding. He stared up at the ceiling, so full of undefinable emotions from the long day that he could scarcely breathe. Everything seemed to be pressing in on him at once — the joy of seeing his parents again after so long, the family farm so familiar to him that he could paint it from memory, his cousins, his aunts, his uncles, the cosmic sweep of aurora in a color only found over Lysatra. 

The peculiar ache in his chest when he thought of his father scowling at Thrawn, his cousins whispering _what is that?_ at the dinner table, staring with open contempt at the only friend Eli had managed to make in the Imperial Navy. 

The way that ache deepened when he listened to Thrawn talking about Csilla in that awful, empty voice. 

Eli rolled onto his back with a sigh, reaching behind him to fluff up the flat government-issue pillow beneath his head. “You never answered the question, you know,” he said into the dark.

“You asked many questions tonight, Ensign Vanto.”

“The original one,” Eli said. “Do you ever miss your family?”

There was a long silence; across the passageway, the red glow disappeared as Thrawn closed his eyes.

“I’ve answered that one,” said Thrawn, so quietly Eli barely heard him.

And in a way, Eli supposed he had.


End file.
